Texas Gov. Rick Perry Indicted on Abuse of Power
- Updated Aug 18, 2014
Texas Gov. Rick Perry was indicted last week on two counts of abuse of power. Perry has said he is innocent and plans to fight the charges.
The charges come from a veto threat he made last year against Travis County District Attorney Rosemary Lehmberg. Perry wanted Lehmberg to resign after she was arrested for drunk driving. If she didn’t resign, Perry said he would veto legislation to fund the Public Integrity Unit, a unit run by Lehmberg’s office.
“If I had to do it again, I would make exactly the same decision,” Perry said Sunday.
Perry is expected to turn himself in early this week for fingerprinting and a mug shot.
“I'm a believer that everything happens for a reason, so in hindsight I can value my own experience as a conservative governor dealing with leftwing activists who would stop at nothing to take out a successful Republican,” Sarah Palin wrote in an opinion article.
But another opinion article by Errol Louis suggested Perry shouldn’t be worried about the “scandal.”
“Perry wouldn't be the first modern presidential candidate to hit the trail with a scandal clanging in the background like noisy cans tied to the back of his campaign bus. But history suggests that a messy local political scene, with all its feuds and ethical shenanigans, is rarely a deal breaker on the national stage,” Louis wrote.
Publication date: August 18, 2014
